In all my years in business watching some of my carriers merge with someone else, it has been a bad move. The acquired carrier has a bunch of good employees lose out and replaced by the acquiring company employees who have done a poor job writing and retaining business. Safeco made a complete mess after acquiring American States. Now, Safeco has been absorbed by Liberty Mutual and struggling to find their own identity.
Completely understandable! Whether it be Carrier M&A or a Brokerage M&A, there is always going to be loss of talent due to incompatible Cultures, ego fights, greed, or just unnecessary overlap- the loss of talent is often another’s gain unless one tries to enforce the new (legal form of ) Slavery of Non-competes – never the less- even with a timeout of a year or so- it is not uncommon for the competition to begin. During the interim, the loss of talent can frequently give rise to a loss in business to other legal competitors.
In all my years in business watching some of my carriers merge with someone else, it has been a bad move. The acquired carrier has a bunch of good employees lose out and replaced by the acquiring company employees who have done a poor job writing and retaining business. Safeco made a complete mess after acquiring American States. Now, Safeco has been absorbed by Liberty Mutual and struggling to find their own identity.
Completely understandable! Whether it be Carrier M&A or a Brokerage M&A, there is always going to be loss of talent due to incompatible Cultures, ego fights, greed, or just unnecessary overlap- the loss of talent is often another’s gain unless one tries to enforce the new (legal form of ) Slavery of Non-competes – never the less- even with a timeout of a year or so- it is not uncommon for the competition to begin. During the interim, the loss of talent can frequently give rise to a loss in business to other legal competitors.
To think otherwise is naive.